Introduction to "Broken Rib Ranch"

In high school, I grudgingly wrote a short story to fulfill an assignment. It centered on the freedom and excitement I felt whenever I ventured out on my motorcycle. An unexpected result was praise from my English teacher, who believed I had a gift for writing. For the remainder of the school year, she pushed me to pursue a career in writing. However, upon graduation, I learned that my parents expected me to earn a living so that I could move out of their house. The lure of the highway enticed me more than college; so I choose a profession in trucking and hit the road. I soon realized trucking wasn't as glamorous as it was portrayed in movies like Smokey and the Bandit. The long hours and isolation gave way to loneliness. My only companion became the nonstop chatter over my CB. I virtually had no social life. The loneliest aspect was that my romantic life was nonexistent ... until six years later, during a hiatus, when I met my future wife, Diana. It appeared I had found the woman of my dreams—but, like all dreams, it ended when Diana wanted a horse. One horse became two, then doubled, and then doubled again. I spent the next thirty years being stomped on, bitten, and kicked while mending broken fences and broken ribs. When Diana got a misconceived notion to rescue a herd of wild horses from Canada, it almost sent me over the edge—and then one day it suddenly occurred to me, I finally had something to write about. Without Diana, my life would have been as dull as a high school English class.